The third and last Ex Oriente Film 2019 workshop session will take place March 7-13 in Prague at East Doc Platform. Who will be the tutors and experts that will provide guidance to workshop participants in developing their projects?
Ex Oriente Film Lead Tutors:
Mikael Opstrup
Mikael Opstrup, a dedicated documentarist since making of his first documentary – now hidden from the public in his cellar. In 1979 he graduated in film from the University of Copenhagen. Most of the 1980s Mikael worked in distribution and theatrical release of documentaries. Attended script writing at the Danish Film School in 1988. Worked as freelance producer and production manager up through the 1990s. Organized the film festival Films from the South in 1995 - 98. Made a desk cross-over in 1998 - 2002, working as production adviser at the Danish Film Institute. Attended EAVE in 1998/99. Since 2000 Mikael has worked as tutor at a large number of workshops and forums around Europe and in the Middle East. In 2002 – 2008 he was co-owner and producer at Final Cut Productions in Copenhagen where he produced a number of international documentaries. Was board member of EDN from 2005 to 2008, the last year as chairman. From 2011-19 Mikael worked as Head of Studies at EDN where he also was the editor of ‘The EDN Co-production Guide’. Since 2009 Mikael has served as lead production tutor at Ex Oriente Film Workshop.
Iikka Vehkalahti
Iikka is Executive Producer of Rough Cut Service and Dare To Dream Asia. His own company IV Films is producing and tutoring documentary films. Iikka was a Commissioning Editor for the Finnish Broadcasting Company, YLE Documentaries, in Finland from 1998 until March 2015. He was an Executive Producer for Steps For The Future and one of the Series Producers for Why Democracy. IV Films is one of the main producers of Machines by Rahul Jain and co-producer in Winnie by Pascal Lamche. Both were awarded at Sundance 2017. At IDFA 2016 there were 8 films Rough Cut Service had worked with, among them the winner of feature length films: Nowhere To Hide.
Ivana Pauerová Miloševičová
Sarajevo-born director and script developer living in the Czech Republic. She graduated from Charles University’s Faculty of Humanities and from Prague’s Film Academy (FAMU). Her documentaries include Never Been Better, on the situation in postwar Bosnia, and Ladies in White, about the wives, mothers, and sisters of Cuban dissidents. From 2003 to 2012 she headed the Ex Oriente Film workshop for the Institute of Documentary Film and the East European Forum. She works as an external lecturer for FAMU. In 2009 she was elected to the executive committee of the European Documentary Network (EDN). Since 2012 she has cooperated with Czech Television in the role of project supervisor and script developer for documentary films and series.
Filip Remunda
Filip Remunda is a Czech director and producer. In 2005 he graduated from FAMU’s Department of Documentary Film in the class of Karel Vachek. During his studies he attended the Sam Spiegel Film and Television School in Jerusalem. He lectured at the Flaherty Documentary Seminar in the USA. He co-founded the Institute of Documentary Film (IDF) and is actively involved in lecturing at the Ex Oriente Film, an international documentary development workshop organized by IDF. He runs the independent production company Hypermarket Film. Selected filmography: Czech Peace (co-directed with Vít Klusák, 2010, Hypermarket Film, Czech Television, Taskovski Films); Epochal Trip of Mr. Triska to Russia (2011, Czech Television) and Czech Journal (co-director, 2013–2015, documentary series, Hypermarket Film, Czech Television), Steam on the River (dir. with Robert Kirchhoff, 2015, 87’, Hypermarket Film, atelier.doc, Czech TV, RTVS), The Near Far East (2015, Czech TV, 68').
Ex Oriente Film Guest Tutors & Experts:
Esther van Messel
Esther van Messel, born 1965 in Vienna, lives in Switzerland and holds a Bachelor's degree in film & television production and in history from the University of Tel Aviv. In 1990, she joined Warner Bros. Israel and became Head of Distribution. From 1992 she produced international feature films and documentaries as Head of Co-Production and Sales for an independent production company in Zurich. Since 1998, Esther van Messel runs her own company FIRST HAND FILMS in Zurich and Berlin. FHF represents close to 300 hand-picked films and 200 producers from all over the world for sales. Esther also acts as Executive Producer for selected projects and her company is present at all major festivals around the year. Since 2013, FHF also distributes films theatrically in Swiss cinemas.
Johannes Rosenberger
Producer of documentaries, co-founder of dok.at, co-founder and associate of the world sales company Autlook Filmsales, representative of the Green Party’s entrepreneurs’ organization, part of the Austrian association for the film and music industry. Chairman of the supporting association of Diagonale film festival, member of the European Film Academy. Lecturer specializing in international documentary co-productions.
Erik Winker
Born 1973 in Stuttgart. Studies in Communication, Film Science, Educational Science and TV Production in Münster, Berlin and Manchester, finishing with a Master degree. Afterwards studies in film direction at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne, finishing with diploma and the feature-length documentary Solo Ultra. 2003-2007 fully employed producer at LICHTBLICK Film Cologne and involved in several national and international co-productions. Teaching assignments at various film schools and univesities such as HS Mainz, ifs Cologne or MHMK Cologne and tutor for national and international film workshops. Regular member of funding and festival juries and chairman of the filmmaker´s association Filmbüro NW e.V.
Myrocia Watamaniuk
Myrocia Watamaniuk is Senior International Programmer at Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival in Toronto. She has programmed fiction and non-fiction features and shorts for over 20 years, holding programming positions at Toronto International Film Festival, Aspen ShortsFest, and Canadian Film Centre’s Worldwide Short Film Festival. As a broadcaster and television producer, she has hosted television series and appeared on CBC News, CBC Toronto and Rogers TV.
Niki Mossböck
She was born 1969 in Graz, studied psychology from 1988 to 1991 at the Karl-Franzens-University and worked as an assistant director at the Theater im Keller. From 1993 to 2000 she studied Film editing and Cinematography at the Filmakademie Wien in Vienna and has worked as a freelance editor since then. She also holds film workshops and lectures and is repeatedly invited to juries. She has been a board member of the Austrian Editors Association since 2007.
Ivo Andrle
Ivo Andrle is a Czech cinema operator and film distributor. Since 1999 he has co-managed Aero, Prague's cult movie theater, eventually adding two other art cinemas in the city. He is also a cofounder and CEO of Aerofilms, one of the Czech Republic's leading art-house distribution companies. He graduated in international trade from the University of Economics in Prague. With 15 years' experience, he is an internationally recognized specialist and consultant in the fields of cinema operation and film distribution. He is also part of a unique domestic team that takes inspiration from innovative approaches and then tries, with greater or lesser success, to implement them in the Czech cultural sphere.
Nanfu Wang
Nanfu Wang is an Emmy-nominated Chinese filmmaker based in New York. Wang’s feature debut, Hooligan Sparrow , was shortlisted for the 2017 Academy Award for best documentary feature. It also won a Film Independent Spirit Award, an IDA Documentary Award, a Peabody Award, a Cinema Eye Honors Award, and the George Polk Award. Her second feature documentary, I Am Another You, won two special jury awards. The last film, One Child Nation (2019), won the Grand Jury Prize for Documentary Feature in 2019.
Fredrik Gertten
Fredrik Gertten is an awardwinning Swedish director and journalist. His latest works Becoming Zlatan (2016), Bikes VS Cars (2015), Big Boys Gone Bananas!* (2012) and Bananas!* (2009) have met audiences in over 100 countries and screened at leading festivals. In 1994, Fredrik founded the production company WG Film. He previously worked as a foreign correspondent and columnist for radio, TV and press in Africa, Latin America, Asia and around Europe. Today he combines filmmaking with a role as a creative producer at WG Film– one of Sweden’s most prominent documentary production companies. In October 2017 he was named Honorary Doctor at Malmö University’s Faculty of Culture and Society for his work as a documentary filmmaker.
Martin Horyna
Since 2011, Martin Horyna has been a member of Program Department at the Karlovy Vary IFF which is held annually in July in the Czech Republic. At present, Martin is programming documentaries from all around the world and fiction films from the Latin America and part of Asia. His previous experience as a film journalist and critic includes working for iNDiEFiLM.cz, a Czech website specialized in independent and auteur cinema, which he co-founded in 2009, and film magazines such as Cinepur or Film a doba.
Christopher Small
Christopher Small is a writer, filmmaker, and programmer, originally from the United Kingdom and currently based in Prague. He is the Project Manager of the Locarno Critics Academy, a respected workshop in film criticism that runs during Locarno Film Festival. Christopher will also curate Shefffield Doc/Fest's 2020 retrospective to be announced at a later date.
